Comments on: Solicitors - Qualified for…

By: Mallorca Property

Mallorca Property — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 08:06:46 +0000

Mallorca Property…

More and more international buyers are investing in property at Mallorca…

By: Usefully Employed

Usefully Employed — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 12:14:07 +0000

Sure, you start as a trainee at Herbert Smith you’ll be on nearly £40k. This post isn’t about them. If you work for a small ‘high street’ firm instead, which I’d guess a huge proportion of solicitors do, and you are, say, in the North West, coming out of uni (having self-funded £7,000 + maintenance for your LPC) you’ll get:

Two year training contract: £15,332 p.a. - minimum trainee salary
Year 1 qualified - £21,000-£26,000
Year 2 - £22,000-£27,000
Year 3 - £25,000-£30,000
Year 4 - £29,000-£33,000
details here

So you basically have to be in the job for six years before you’re guaranteed to be on £30,000. Is that monumental? Benefits (eg pension, holidays and so on) will be minimal. The salary in the later years is equivalent or (taking other benefits into account) significantly less than NQ teachers can expect. And look at them.

Solicitors are (whatever the age-old cynicism) just as much a fundamental part of social fabric as social workers, policemen, teachers, and the rest of them, but are reviled even at the ‘low’ end of the profession as somehow ripping everyone off.

Where I do agree is that if they don’t like it they should do something else. It’s only the market that should set salaries - but these are arguments you could use against striking public servants as easily as you could grumbling solicitors.

By: simply wondered

simply wondered — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 10:20:11 +0000

i agree with all (but one) of your sentiments and am grateful to learn the (several) things i didn’t know - but i must take issue with this:
‘This is all terribly sad, as it commercialises the role of solicitor’ - didn’t that happen the day some one first thought of charging for advice? as a necomer to the law (as you know) i am constntly surprised and amused by how its practicioners put themselves and their job on a pedestal. it’s a job, they get paid (usually fantastically well - and if you disagree try comparing the poorest most altruistic lawyer with those at the bottom of the arts pile) and nobody forces them to do it. other things are available to do with their lives; some of them involve getting sweaty and dirty (and not in a fun way) and earning rather less.
sure the job is important and (often) worthwhile (for instance the vital importance of the diana inquest to poor grieving mr fayed) but we are not talking feeding the poor or putting an end to war here.
it seems a god job, but let’s heave it off the pedestal so it can be better subjected to the scrutiny you so properly demand.

By: 24 April Daily news and podcast « Insitelaw magazine

24 April Daily news and podcast « Insitelaw magazine — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 06:04:04 +0000

[...] dressed up as Darth Vader (from BBC News): “I hope the force will soon be with him.” Usefully Employed has a rather good rant about the future of the legal profession House of Lords decision in Ashley v Chief Constable of Sussex Police - Tort / Battery. See: Law [...]

By: headless

headless — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 12:23:41 +0000

Interesting post, thanks. Couple of issues I’d like to respond to:
1. Prof Indemnity Insurance - those firms who are paying huge PII premiums are perhaps those you identify as not delivering. It is possible, with proper management and risk assessment and client service to substantially reduce your PII premiums. For eg, when the market for PII first opened up, the small/medium “high street” firm with which I was involved had an annual premium of around £40k. Since then the firm has not got any smaller and turnover was about 25% higher. Last year it was £15k - with a £0 excess. Vigorous negotiation year on year with the broker has seen the premium reduce every year, this includes negotiation on premium but also pushing the firm’s risk management procedures and client satisfaction ratings.
2. Excellence. Couldn’t agree more. I think this is one area where solicitors may especially be complacent. Many partners have no comprehension of doing business in a truly competitive market and many are going to fall by the wayside when the Legal Services Act comes fully live. Even many of those firms who consider themselves to be “switched on” are going to be in for a big surprise. I am an non-legal manager in the legal field and it is disappointing that the warnings that I and my peers seem constantly to be giving are falling on deaf (or worse: indifferent) ears.